US President Barack Obama and his powerful US Senate adversary struck a conciliatory tone on Wednesday, but Obama’s plans to proceed with new immigration rules foreshadowed a bumpy start to his relationship with a Republican-controlled Congress.
Obama and Mitch McConnell, who will become majority leader when Republicans take charge in the Senate in January, signaled they hoped to get past a previously frosty relationship to pass legislation on priorities on which they can both agree.
“As president, I have a unique responsibility to try and make this town work,” Obama, a Democrat, said at a White House news conference. “So, to everyone who voted, I want you to know that I hear you.”
Obama lauded McConnell, with whom he said he hoped to share some Kentucky bourbon, and House Speaker John Boehner for expressing the wish to seek common ground after the elections. He spoke to both men earlier in the day.
McConnell said he believed Obama was interested in moving forward on trade agreements and tax reform, two issues at a standstill in Washington because of political differences.
“This gridlock and dysfunction can be ended. It can be ended by having a Senate that actually works,” McConnell told reporters in his home state Kentucky.
But the words of reconciliation only went so far.
Obama said he intended to go ahead with plans to implement executive actions by the end of this year that could remove the threat of deportation from millions of undocumented immigrants.
McConnell said it would be like “waving a red flag in front of a bull” for Obama to take unilateral action on immigration. The Democrat-controlled Senate passed a bill on the issue last year but House Republicans did not support it.
